


the unfolding physicality of our unseen actuality

by heartthrobholtzy



Series: Speechless Scientists [1]
Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: F/F, just super-adorable dorks, mild jealousy, stupid adorable oblivious flirting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-27
Updated: 2016-07-28
Packaged: 2018-07-27 04:16:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7603069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartthrobholtzy/pseuds/heartthrobholtzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How do you deal with a colleague you want to kiss?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Erin showered out the ectoplasm and plaster dust that tonight's call had left in her hair, pulled on her favourite old Weird Science t-shirt and sank into the squishy, second-hand sofa that lived on the ground floor of the firehouse. Pizza had been ordered, and the rest of the team had wandered off to finish up their various projects. No one else had been slimed, so Erin had had first run at the shower.

It had been a simple call out - a T2 haunting with only minor non-corporeal aggression - but with prep, getting across midtown, busting the ghost, packing down, driving the converted hearse back to the fire house, then putting everything away again made it into a hassle that took up the best part of their Friday night. The team had been intending to go out to celebrate at a local bar. Drink a little, dance a little. Flirt a little in Holtz’s case.

Maybe Erin wasn't too sorry to be staying in after all. Abby had no interest in dating and never had, Patty complained that men were too intimidated to ask her out now that she was a city-saving ghostbusting hero, and Erin had never had much luck with men, or with anyone really. But Holtzmann… Women flocked to her. Her flirty wink and wide, teasing grin would have been enough on their own, but now she was practically a celebrity she could barely move without being hit on. Holtzmann mostly politely accepted phone numbers and then never called, but occasionally Erin found her in the lab early, wearing the same clothes as yesterday, presumably come straight from an overnighter with one of her adoring fans.

“You want a beer to go with this pizza?” Patty called from the firehouse kitchen.  
“No thanks!” Erin called back. She dithered. “But you feel free to!”  
“Oh, I feel free to.” answered Patty, taking a seat next to Erin. “Today has been a loooong day.” The doorbell rang. Erin went to answer the door while Patty called up the stairs to the others. The delivery guy claimed not to have change, so Erin ended up tipping him sixteen dollars on a twenty four dollar order. Flustered by the interaction, she came back to the squishy sofa and plonked the pizzas carelessly on the coffee table in front of Abby and Patty. 

“Do you want an episode of Ghost Jumpers?” Erin asked. Abby had been enjoying hate-watching and loudly debunking the show lately. With a squeak of denim against steel, Holtzmann descended from the ceiling, sliding down the firemans pole effortlessly. Her thick boots smacked the concrete floor, and she saluted the rest of the team before heading to grab herself a beer from the kitchen.

“What episode were we up to?” Abby asked.  
“They spent twenty minutes confusing Comanche native Americans with Cherokee.” answered Patty immediately. She enjoyed correcting the poor understanding of history and geography in Ghost Jumpers as much as Abby enjoyed pointing out that they didn't understand basic biology, nevermind advanced physics. “Like you'd get Cherokee ghosts in Colorado!” Patty looked around her with a smile, waiting for someone to agree with her. Holtz, open beer in her hand, plopped herself in the minute space between Patty and Erin. She was partially sat on top of both women.  
“Baby, why you always gotta do that?” asked Patty in frustration before getting up and moving to the armchair. Holtz shrugged.  
“I like to snuggle.” Holtz drawled with a broad grin. Her thigh was still overlapping Erin's. She kicked off her boots and wrapped her legs underneath her.

“Oh crap, I'm out of battery, I'm gonna grab your laptop, Erin”. said Abby, fetching Erin's laptop from the nearest workstation and navigating to the Ghost Jumpers online streaming page.  
“Ha! Someone has been googling themselves!” Abby turned the laptop around so everyone could see that the navigation bar had autofilled the ‘g’ in ‘Ghost Jumpers’ to ‘Gilbert Erin’. Erin could tell she was starting to blush. Holtz back stiffened where she had been relaxed against her.  
“I have not! I mean… Not recently, anyway…”  
“That is just sad, girl.” laughed Patty.  
“Really.” Agreed Abby.  
Erin felt hot and constricted, and having Holtz practically on top of her didn't help. She nudged Holtzmann away, trying to free herself to cool down, but the blonde still seemed strangely still and unresponsive. Holtzmann was studiously playing with the cheese on her pizza.  
“Let's just watch the show.” said Erin desperately. They settled down and eventually Erin felt her blush subside. After a few minutes, Holtz relaxed into Erin again.


	2. Chapter 2

Erin wondered whether she was had a specific electromagnetic signature that made ionised ectoplasm particularly magnetised towards her, rather than, say, Holtzmann who never seemed to get slimed. Maybe Holtz’s long history of blowing things up had simply given her quick reflexes. 

The shower was running before Erin realised that she'd run out of shampoo. Naked but for a towel, Erin jiggled indecisively. Go downstairs and get the spare bottle of shampoo, or try and get the waxy gloop out of her hair with nothing but warm water? She sighed and turned off the water. 

Heading downstairs, Erin saw Holtzmann was alone in the downstairs workspace. She was shimmying, dancing, singing into one of the multitude of screwdrivers that she always kept in her pockets, completely oblivious to Erin padding down the stairs in bare feet.

She was also casually using Abby’s laptop. Erin paused at the bottom of the stairs, watching, unsure of herself. Tap, tap, tap, pirouette. Scroll, scroll, scroll, do the robot. Click, click, click, twirl screwdriver like a baton. She saw Erin.  
“Oh hey.” Holtz stopped dancing and casually closed all tabs on the browser window. “Just checking the weather. Wondering if this solar storm we’re predicted might affect the equipment.” Holtz moonwalked away from Erin's workstation. “Nice outfit.” she said with a wolfish smile. “That's certainly one take on casual Friday”. Erin clutched her towel closer to her as she blushed furiously.  
“I've run out of shampoo.” Erin said, po-faced.

While she was in the shower, Erin had a stroke of brilliance. Maybe there was a way to measure ectoplasmic polarity that would determine whether it was coming for her specifically or if she just hadn't spent enough time throwing a ball around as a child. Hair still wet, she dragged on the clean clothes she always kept at the firehouse and raced out of the bathroom to find Abby. There was a loud crackling coming from the door to the large second floor lab. That meant Holtz was in there. Erin raced down another set of stairs, and Abby was at her desk on the ground floor.  
“Abby, what did we establish the combined atomic weight of ectoplasm was?”  
“Uh… Let me look it up.” She clicked out of the spreadsheet she'd been doing calculations in and opened up a browser. “Oh Erin, this is just sad. You need to stop doing this.”  
“Doing what?!” Asked Erin, startled. She moved around so she could see the screen. The autofill had suggested Abby complete her search with ‘..rin Gilbert boyfriend’.  
“I swear it's not me!” Erin denied hotly. Abby rolled her eyes.  
“Look, maybe you should try that dating app, Swipr. Or you could sign up with one of those elite dating things for minor celebrities. Maybe you could get a date with a hot newscaster or something.”  
“I don't want to talk about it.” Erin said through gritted teeth. 

The rest of the afternoon was spent in equations. They still hadn't figured out exactly what ectoplasm was made of, it seemed to be a compound of several heretofore undiscovered elements, which made figuring out whether it was magnetised to our poles, or the poles of some ethereal plane…. Complicated. Eventually though, Erin was happy with her work. She'd run out of theoretical physics and needed a genius nuclear engineer to tell her if it was practical. She felt uneasy about going to find Holtz.

“Hey Abby, do you mind seeing what Holtzmann has to say about these numbers while I order pizza?”  
“We had pizza already, I'll order Chinese food. Go talk to the other genius, and see if you two can't figure out how we can all avoid some slime. I don't think it's healthy for you to get slimed so much while we still don't know what it is.”

Erin gulped and headed up the stairs.


	3. Chapter 3

Holtzmann’s lab was always the most dangerous part of the firehouse. Even when it was empty, it still had a huge hole in the floor for the fireman's pole, piles of weird wires and strange pipes and a distinct smell of slightly singed hair. When Holtzmann herself was in the lab, Erin sometimes felt like there was a lump in her throat that no amount of polite coughing could get rid of. She cautiously pushed open the door. Nothing was on fire. That was a good sign. There was no music playing, and no crackling, or flashes of lights. All good safety signs, albeit unusual in Holtz’s lab. Maybe she'd gone out dumpster diving or something.

Erin walked carefully around the lab, checking that Holtz wasn't working on something delicate in a quiet corner, but feeling like looking too closely would be somehow invading her friends privacy. 

As she was walking past a half-sized closet with no door, a blonde head popped out at ground level. Holtz had one eye closed behind her trademark yellow goggles.

“Whatcha doing?”  
“Oh! I was just looking for you, I wanted to ask about…”  
“I can see straight up your skirt.” She beamed, and Erin felt herself redden. “Get in here with me.” Holtz disappeared back into the strange space. Erin had no choice but to get on her hands and knees and crawl into the weird little storage space.

Inside, Holtzmann was lying on her back. She was lying on a blanket, pressed against the wall on one side. If she'd stretched up her arms, she could have touched the low ceiling. The tiny room was dark except for the blue-green light of hundreds of tiny glow in the dark stars.  
“Welcome to my astral projection chamber, thank you for volunteering, please loosen any tight clothing and lie down next to me.”  
“I didn't volunteer, so much as…” she started.  
“The idea is that we could learn how to visit some of the other planes of existence, maybe take the fight to them, as it were.” Holtz explained excitedly.  
“Wow, Holtz, that's… Wow.”  
“It's in its early stages.” Holtzmann was a little more measured. “Do you know how to astral project?”  
“Um, don't you just lie down and calmly picture your body above you?”  
“Pretty much.” There was a moment of silence, then Erin lay down next to Holtzmann. The space was cramped, and she was pressed along the whole length of Holtzmann’s body.  
“You could do with a pillow in here!” she half-joked.  
“Here.” Holtzmann said, and snaked her arm under Erin's neck. “Better?”  
Erin swallowed, and smiled weakly. She was so close to Holtzmann she could smell oil and electricity. Something else too. Not quite floral, but sort of... Organic? Like trees in the rain. Holtzmann was so warm. The light from the tiny glowing stars was so beautiful. She relaxed.

Within minutes, Erin's eyes began to close. She was trying so hard to picture herself floating her body, but she was so drowsy suddenly, and so warm, and she felt so safe with Holtzmann's arm around her. Holtz’s fingers never stopped twitching and tapping, but it didn't disturb her. The last thing she felt before she fell asleep was Holtzmann gently kissing her temple.

When Erin woke up, Holtzmann was lying on her side staring at her.  
“Oh my god, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have fallen asleep, I didn't mean to, I just…”  
“Confession.” Holtz interrupted in a low voice. “It's not up and running yet. This is mostly just where I take naps.”  
“Oh! Um. Oh. Ok. Why did you make me come in here then?”  
Holtz smirked and arched her eyebrow.  
“I like to snuggle.”


	4. Chapter 4

Holtz went downstairs to see if she could scare up some of the Chinese food Abby had ordered two hours ago, before their nap. Erin felt strangely shy, loitering in the lab. She straightened her back. Be professional. She marched to the computer console. She needed to talk to Holtz about equipment to test the polarity of ionised ectoplasm. She opened the search function. And started to type.

‘...rin Gilbert girlfriend’ autofill helpfully suggested. Erin was stunned. She looked over her shoulder to check Holtz wasn't heading into the lab, and then clicked on to Holtzmann's search history. 

‘Erin Gilbert girlfriend’  
‘Erin Gilbert relationship’  
‘Erin ghostbuster date’  
‘Gilbert ghostbuster single’  
‘Ghostbuster Erin dating’

The lump in Erin's throat was back. Why was Holtzmann so interested? She had a suspicion, but that couldn't be right, why would someone like Holtz, someone cool and confident and who had so many offers of sex from gorgeous fans care whether plain old Erin Gilbert had a boyfriend. Or a girlfriend, she added to herself.

Erin and Holtzmann shared the leftover vegetarian noodles without really saying anything. Holtz insisted on using her precision engineering tweezers instead of chopsticks, and Erin didn't even really mind.

The next morning, Erin let herself into the firehouse early. She was feeling cheerful and optimistic and excited to start the day. She was wearing her favourite blouse, the one with the tiny bow tie, though it looked more relaxed and fun with a pair of jeans than with her plaid suit. She'd had to get rid of that. No dry cleaner would even agree to touch it. But the shirt had survived.

Erin made her way to the kitchen to put a pot of coffee on ahead of everyone else arriving, but as she entered the kitchen she spotted Holtzmann. She was wearing the same clothes as yesterday; a floppy shirt covered in the signs of the zodiac and a men's waistcoat. She looked irresistibly mussed, even more so than usual; like a lover had run their hands through her hair and pulled at all her clothes. She also looked tired. She must have gone straight from sharing a nap and Chinese food with Erin to some… Some random girl's apartment. Erin felt herself flush. Her face felt hot and she couldn't breathe and she felt completely, inexplicably angry. Without realising what she was doing, Erin banged her travel mug down on to the kitchen counter. Holtzmann jumped at the sound, but her eyes lit up when she saw Erin.

“Hey you. Same idea, huh?” Erin stared blankly back at Holtzmann. “Save us all from Kevin's spit-take coffee? It's a public service really.” Erin breathed in deeply. She tried to smile warmly but her face felt all tight and unnatural.  
“I'll let you get on with it!” Erin said, too brightly, and then left before she could see the hurt and confusion on Holtzmann's face.


	5. Chapter 5

Holtz had ideas all the time. Not having ideas was much harder, as was making ideas into reality, and stopping your ideas from accidentally destroying the planet when they got loose. All things she struggled with on a daily basis. But ideas came easily. Today Holtz was going to spend the morning making one of her tamest, least exciting, least likely to backfire ideas into a reality. For Erin.

She'd gotten a recipe for hydrophobic spray from the internet. She'd customised it a bit, and then carefully applied it to Erin's jumpsuit. Holtz was jiggling up and down with excitement at the thought of showing Erin what her new and improved suit could do, but she wanted to wait until she could demonstrate. Holtz paced around her lab, tightening the occasional bolt, twiddling with the odd bit of wire, but not settling to anything all morning, just waiting for a call. Her coloured safety glasses didn't feel right today, and she took them off and put them back on at least a dozen times. She felt excited and scared and itchily exhausted from her long night.

“You know I can hear you pacing from the library.” Patty declared. “And there's a lot less bangs and whistles than usual. You ok, baby?”  
Holtzmann put her tinted safety goggles around her forehead again and rubbed her eyes.  
“I had a nap yesterday, so I didn't sleep well. That all.”  
“Come have lunch with us. I know you hate regular meals, but your blood sugar’ll thank you.” Holtz assented, and followed Patty obediently down the stairs.  
“What, no pole today?” called Abby as soon as she saw Holtzmann on the stairs.  
“Big night for Holtzmann.” answered Erin in a shrill, sing-song voice. “Getting laaaaaaiiiiid.” She bit into her sandwich viciously.  
“Wait, what?” said Holtz. She tucked her chin tucked in sharply in confusion. “I was here all night. I had chemicals that I couldn't leave.”  
“Oh.” is the only response from Erin.


	6. Chapter 6

The atmosphere remained all through lunch. Patty and Abby furiously made faces at each other, each trying to communicate exactly what they thought had just happened without making a sound. Erin stared at her lunch, only occasionally taking tiny bites. Holtzmann played with a slice of reheated pizza.

Unable to take the silence any more, Patty interjected. “Why don't you stop playing with that old pizza and go get a scone or something?” Holtz looked up in surprise, like she'd forgotten she was surrounded by people. She nodded.  
“Aye-aye boss.” She saluted. “Want anything?”  
“I'll come with you.” said Erin.  
“I can manage, you don't have to..” Holtz protested.  
“Don't be silly! I'll help. Lattes for everyone?” Abby and Patty nodded, wide-eyed, then turned around and made ‘WHAT WAS THAT’ faces at each other.

Holtzmann strode down the street in silence. She wanted a quadruple espresso so she could try and figure out why she felt like Erin was mad at her today, after they'd had a nap together, and she'd spent all night customising Erin's kit. Maybe she was doing it again. She'd done it when she was thirteen, and when she was nineteen, and when she was twenty-three. Maybe she was doing it again now. Shit. That thing where she got super-invested and attached to a person who felt increasingly uncomfortable and smothered and then they eventually told her that they were straight and they didn't like her like that and they never had.

She thought she'd stopped doing that years ago.

“I'm really sorry” started Erin. “I don't know why I thought you'd…”  
“Gotten laaaiiiiiiid?” smirked Holtz.  
“I just assumed it was like the other times, when you've..” Holtzmann stares blankly at Erin. Realisation dawned on Erin.“You've been staying at the firehouse a lot?”  
“Well… Yeah? I live above a bar, so I normally take a nap in my AP space at the weekends instead of going home and listening to drunk people until 3am. I'd rather be working.”  
“Oh.” says Erin again in a small voice.  
“...you thought I was hooking up with someone? Who?” Holtz wrinkles her nose, baffled.  
“Well, it's just, I mean, um...”  
“Queer girls love ghostbusters?” Holtzmann guessed. She suddenly understood. They joined the back of the line in the coffee shop. She smiled broadly. Erin was blushing at her use of the word queer.  
“I mean, it's just, well, you get so many numbers, and, I mean, I always assumed…”  
“I've been half in love with you since the first time you walked into my lab.” burst out Holtzmann. Erin's eyes widened.  
“Really?”  
“Really.” said Holtz softly. She suddenly became aware of how close their faces were. She looked at Erin's lips. They were just inches away from her own. She could feel Erin's breath.  
“There you are!” burst out Abby. She was out of breath and fully knitted up. “Emergency. We need to go. Now."


	7. Chapter 7

Erin and Holtzmann changed in the back of the car. It was one of the advantages of a converted hearse. Lots of space in the back.  
“You guys ok back there?” called Abby over her shoulder.  
“I've been working on something for your suit.” Holtz breathed into Erin's ear. “It should now repel slime.” She sounded darkly excited in a way that sent a shiver down Erin's spine.  
“We’re good! Suited and booted!” Erin answered Abby. Her big, dark eyes flicked on to Holtz face. “Thank you.”

The owner had insisted that there was a bloodbath going down, but it was just a very minor wailing wall. Non-corporeal. Distressing, rather than aggressive. Once they'd finished the job, Abby took Patty with her to go and carefully explain the dangers and expense of overstating your emergency to the Ghostbusters. Erin and Holtzmann were packing up, putting their mass of unused equipment on the trolley to be wheeled back out to the car. Holtz felt on top of the world. She didn't even mind how little sleep she'd had. Erin had wanted to kiss her, she'd felt it.

Maybe she should go kiss her now, while she had the chance.

Their faces were very close again.  
“Holtz…” murmured Erin, looking from Holtz's eyes to her lips, and back again. Holtzmann's arms were around her waist.  
Just then a chunk of ectoplasm fell from the ceiling in a long, sticky string, straight on to Erin's shoulder, where, as if by magic, it was completely repelled…. Straight into Holtzmann's face.

Wiping the green gunk out of her eyes, Holtz was forced to look on the bright side. “At least we know my ectophobic spray works.”

***

Later, when everyone had showered, and Holtz had finally gotten a scone, their first kiss was worth the wait. Holtz smiled widely when Erin woke up from another nap in the Astral Projection closet.  
“Come here often?” she asked, teasing.


End file.
